Finally, after the resurrection of the Lord, one of his disciples, Cleopas, being sorrowful according to the error of all his fellow disciples, relating to the Lord himself, as to some unknown person, what had happened, spoke thus, saying of Jesus of Nazareth, who was a prophet mighty in deeds and words before God and all the people: how our priests and rulers delivered him to the condemnation of death and fixed him to the cross. But we were hoping that he was the one who would redeem Israel.
In accord with which all the disciples too judged even the assertion of the women, who after the resurrection had seen the Lord, to be ravings; and some of them, though they saw him, did not believe but doubted; and those who were then not present did not believe at all, until afterward they had been in every way chided and rebuked by the Lord himself — since death had so offended them that they thought he had not risen, whom they had implied ought not to have died, because, contrary to their opinion, he had once died.
And so, as far as the disciples themselves are concerned, they are found to have had neither an entire nor a perfect faith, in these ways which we have related; and, what is much graver, as it is written in the Gospel according to John, they even baptized others. Moreover, what will you say of those who are very often baptized by bishops of the worst conversation — who nevertheless at last, when God shall have willed, being convicted in their crimes, are deprived even of that very office, or utterly even of communion? Or what will you determine concerning those who have been baptized by bishops who think perversely or are rather unskilled?
when they have not spoken clearly and completely, or even otherwise than is fitting, in the handing down of the sacrament — when certainly they have either asked something, or, in asking, have heard from those answering something that by no means ought so to be asked or answered — which nevertheless does not greatly harm that right faith of ours; but these simpler men too deliver the mystery of faith, though not so elegantly and composedly as you. For you will surely say, in your singular diligence, that these too must be baptized anew — precisely when the reality is lacking to them, or hinders them, so that they cannot receive that inviolable divine mystery of faith undefiled.
But indeed, O best of men, let us render and grant to the heavenly powers their own strength, and to the condescension of the divine Majesty let us concede its proper operations; and, understanding how great the benefit in it is, let us gladly acquiesce in it. And therefore, since our salvation is established in the baptism of the Spirit, which is for the most part joined with the baptism of water — if baptism be handed down by us, let it be assigned entirely and solemnly and through all things that are written, and let it be delivered without any separation of anything; or if it have been handed down by the lower clergy through necessity, let us await the event, that it may either be supplied by us, or be reserved to be supplied by the Lord:
but if it have been handed down by strangers, let this matter be corrected as it can be and as it admits, because the Holy Spirit is not outside the Church, and faith too cannot be sound, not only among heretics but even among those who are set in schism; and therefore to those who do penance and have been corrected through the doctrine of the truth and through their own faith — which was afterward amended, their heart being purified — succor ought to be given only by spiritual baptism, that is, by the imposition of the bishop's hand and the ministration of the Holy Spirit.
The sign of faith too is with reason wont to be handed down entire in the Church, in this manner and by this reasoning, lest the invocation of the name of Jesus, which cannot be abolished, should seem to be held by us in contempt — which surely ought not to be — although such an invocation, if none of the things we have mentioned have followed, ceases and is void of the working of salvation. For, since the apostle says that baptism is one, then, the invocation of the name of Jesus persevering (because that which has once been invoked cannot be taken away by any man), it is necessary — if we have dared to double it, against the decree of the apostles, in an excess of bestowing, nay rather of superadding, baptism out of zeal —
if he who returns to the Church should be unwilling to be baptized anew, it will come to pass that we defraud of spiritual baptism the very man whom we suppose ought not to be defrauded of the baptism of water. But what will you determine in the case of the catechumen who, perhaps seized in the name of Christ, at once confessed, and before he was permitted to be baptized with water was put to death? Will you pronounce that he has perished because he was not baptized with water, or will you rather reckon that something from without pleads for him unto salvation, although he was not baptized with water? If you shall reckon that he has perished, the sentence of the Lord will come to meet you, saying: Whoever shall confess me before men, I too will confess him before my Father who is in heaven.
For it makes no difference whether he who confesses the Lord be a catechumen or a believer, provided that he confess the very Christ whom it behooves to confess; because the Lord, by confessing him in his turn likewise, adorns his confessor before the Father with the honor of his own martyrdom, as he has promised. Which surely ought not to be taken more broadly, as though it could be extended everywhere; for even some heretic can confess the name of Christ, who nevertheless denies Christ himself, because he believes in another Christ — while the true Christ confesses that it can in no way profit him, since indeed the Lord said that none but himself ought to be brought by us into confession before men, which cannot be done without him and without his venerable name.
And therefore both name and reality ought to stand entire and sincere and uncontaminated and inviolate for the one confessing, no distinction being made of the confessor himself, whether he be just or a sinner, and a perfect Christian or even now imperfect, who at his utmost peril did not fear to confess the Lord. Nor is this contrary to the earlier discussion: because there indeed time remained for correcting the things that are maimed or depraved, and because certain things have been granted to the name of our Lord only, whereas martyrdom cannot be consummated except in him and through the Lord himself; and therefore neither can anyone confess Christ without his name, nor can the name of Christ, without Christ himself, plead for anyone's confession.
Wherefore this whole discussion must be distinguished, that it may be able to become clearer. For the invocation of the name of Jesus can plead only if it be afterward duly supplemented, because both the prophets and the apostles so preached. For James says in the Acts of the Apostles: Men, brethren, hear me: Simon has set forth how first God visited to take from the Gentiles a people for his name; and to this the words of the prophets agree, as it is written: After these things I will return and will rebuild that tabernacle of David which is fallen, and the things of it that are demolished I will rebuild, and I will set it up again, that the residue of men may seek the Lord, and all the nations upon whom my name is invoked over them, says the Lord who does these things.
And so the residue of men — that is, certain of the Jews — and all the nations upon whom the name of the Lord has been invoked, can and must seek the Lord, because the very invocation of the name affords them the occasion, or even imposes on them the necessity, of seeking the Lord; with whom, by means of the holy Scriptures, whether all of them or some, one may nevertheless treat of the truth more boldly than with the Gentiles, upon whom the name of the Lord Jesus, the Son of the living God, has not been invoked, as neither upon the Jews, who receive only the old Scriptures. And therefore men of both these kinds — that is, Jews and Gentiles — when they believe fully as they ought, are baptized in equal manner.
But heretics, already baptized with water in the name of Jesus Christ, are to be baptized only in the Holy Spirit; and in Jesus — which is the only name given under heaven in which we must be saved — death is rightly despised, since, if they so persist, they cannot be saved, because they did not seek the Lord after the invocation of his name over them, like those too who refused to believe, of whom the Lord says: Beware lest anyone lead you into error. For many will come in my name, saying: I am Christ; and they will lead many into error. And again he says: Then if anyone shall say to you, Behold, here is Christ, or there, do not believe.
For false Christs and false prophets will arise and will give great signs and wonders, so that, if it were possible, even the elect would go astray. These mighty works those men will then undoubtedly do under the name of Christ. In which name certain men are seen even now to do some mighty works and to prophesy falsely. But it is certain that they, because they are not Christ's, therefore do not belong to Christ; just as also, if anyone falls away from Christ, clinging to his name alone, he is not much helped — nay rather he is even burdened by this name — though he had before been most faithful, or most just, or honored with some distinction, or endowed with the dignity of confession.
For all these people, by denying the true Christ and introducing or following another—although there is no other at all—leave themselves no hope or salvation, no differently than those who denied Christ before men, whom Christ must of necessity deny, without any account being taken of their prior manner of life, or their disposition, or their rank; and so, inasmuch as they themselves have dared to abolish Christ—that is, their own salvation—they are condemned by a saying of this kind, because it was declared most plainly by the Lord: 'Whoever shall deny me before men, I also will deny him before my Father who is in heaven.'
So that this word 'whoever,' even in the clause about confession, may show us most fully that no condition of the one confessing can be a hindrance—even though that former denier had earlier been either a heretic, or a catechumen, or one just beginning to hear the word, who is not yet baptized, or one converted from heresy to the truth of the faith, or one who had departed from the Church and afterward returned, and then, upon his return, before the bishop's hand had been laid upon him, was seized and compelled by necessity to confess Christ before men—just as, on the other hand, for one who denies Christ no former rank of his own can plead in his favor toward salvation.
For whatever last act is found in a man of this kind, in that each one of us will of necessity be judged, all that he did before being abolished and blotted out. And therefore, since in martyrdom there is so great a change of circumstances in a moment of time, so that in a most swift instant all things can be altered, let no one flatter himself who has lost the occasion of a glorious salvation, if perchance he has excluded himself from it by his own fault—just as did that wife of Lot, who likewise, in the straits of circumstance and against the command of the angels, merely looked back behind her and was turned into a pillar of salt.
By the same reasoning, that heretic also who is slaughtered while confessing the name of Christ can afterward correct nothing, if he has thought wrongly about God or about Christ, since by believing in another God or another Christ he has deceived himself, being a confessor not of Christ, but of Christ's name only; seeing that the apostle consequently says: 'Even if I deliver up my body so as to be burned by fire, but have not love, I gain nothing.' For by such a deed he gains nothing who does not have the love of that God and Christ who through the Law and the Prophets and in the Gospel is proclaimed in this manner: 'You shall love the Lord your God with your whole heart and with your whole soul and with your whole mind,' and 'You shall love your neighbor as yourself.'
For upon these two commandments hang the whole Law and the Prophets, as also John the evangelist says: 'And everyone who loves is born of God and knows God, for God is love.' Just as God also says: 'For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, that everyone who believed in him should not perish, but should have eternal life.'
So that it might plainly appear that the one who does not have within himself this love, of loving us and of being loved by us, gains nothing by an empty confession and suffering—since it is evident and established that he is a heretic who believes in another God or receives another Christ than the one whom the Scriptures of the New and Old Testament plainly proclaim, which without obscurity announce the Almighty Father, Creator of all things, and his Son.
For it will befall them—those who look for salvation from one God after another—that then at last, contrary to their own opinion, they will be condemned to eternal punishment by Christ, the Son of God the Father Almighty, the Creator, whom they blasphemed, when God shall begin to judge the hidden things of men according to the Gospel through Christ Jesus, because they did not believe in him, even though they were washed in his name. And to such a degree can all that baptism of the heretics be corrected, an interval of time intervening, if someone survives and corrects his faith—as our God said in the Gospel according to Luke, speaking to his disciples: 'But I have another baptism to be baptized with.' Likewise according to Mark, by the same reasoning, he said to the sons of Zebedee:
'Can you drink the cup that I drink, or be baptized with the baptism with which I am baptized?'—because he knew that men are to be baptized not only with water but also with their own blood, so that even those baptized with this baptism alone can attain an entire faith and a sincere worthiness of the laver, and those baptized in both ways nonetheless obtain equally and alike the one baptism of salvation and honor. For what was said by the Lord, 'I have another baptism to be baptized with,' does not in this place signify a second baptism, as though there were two baptisms, but shows that a baptism of another kind also, concurring toward the same salvation, has been granted to us.
Both of which kinds it was fitting should first be instituted and sanctified by our Lord himself, so that to us also either one or both kinds might furnish one, not double, saving and honorable baptism; and that certain paths of the one baptism might be so opened to us that sometimes one or another of them might be absent without harm—just as, for the martyrs who suffer for the word, the baptism of water is absent without harm (though we are certain that these too, if they have any respite, are accustomed to be baptized also with water); and likewise, for those who have been lawfully made faithful, the baptism of their own blood is absent without harm, because, being baptized in the name of Christ, they have been redeemed by the most precious blood of the Lord—since both these rivers proceed from one and the same fountain of the Lord's baptism, so that everyone who thirsts may come and drink, as the Scripture says:
'Out of his belly shall flow rivers of living water.' These rivers first appeared in the Lord's passion, when from his pierced side, by the soldier's lance, there flowed blood and water, so as to send forth two rivers of different kind, yet from the same single side—so that whoever, believing, shall drink from both rivers may be filled with the Holy Spirit. For speaking of these rivers the Lord was showing this, signifying the Holy Spirit whom they were to receive who were to believe in him. But the Spirit was not yet given, because Jesus was not yet glorified.
Therefore, in saying in what manner that baptism can be brought forth which the apostle proclaims to be one, it is surely manifest, by that reasoning, that there are different kinds of one and the same baptism flowing from one wound into water and blood—though there are in that case two baptisms of which we have spoken, that is, of one and the same kind, since the baptism of each kind ought to be one, as we have more fully explained. And since we seem to have divided all spiritual baptism into three parts, let us come also to the proof of the account we have set forth, lest we seem to have done this by our own private judgment and rashly. For John, teaching us about our Lord, says in his epistle:
'This is he who came by water and blood, Jesus Christ—not in water only, but in water and blood. And it is the Spirit who bears witness, because the Spirit is truth: for there are three that bear witness, the Spirit and the water and the blood; and these three are one.' So that from these we may gather that the water too is wont to furnish the Spirit, and that one's own blood is wont to furnish the Spirit to men, and that the Spirit itself likewise furnishes the Spirit. For when the water is poured out, as also the blood, the Spirit too has been poured out by the Lord upon all who have believed: assuredly, then, by water and no less by their own blood, and then thereafter by the Holy Spirit, men can be baptized. For Peter says: 'But this is that which was spoken through the prophet:'
'It shall come to pass in the last days, says the Lord, I will pour out my Spirit upon all flesh, and their sons and their daughters shall prophesy, and the young men shall see visions and the old men shall dream dreams. And indeed upon my servants and upon my handmaidens I will pour out of my Spirit.' This Spirit in the Old Testament we find, not indeed everywhere nor abundantly, but shared with others, or even leaping of its own accord upon certain men, or clothing them, or being upon them—just as we observe it was said by the Lord to Moses concerning the seventy elders: 'And I will take away of the Spirit that is upon you, and I will put it upon them.'
On which account also, according to his promise, God from another source—from the Spirit that had been upon Moses—placed it upon them, and they prophesied in the camp; at which Moses, as a spiritual man, rejoiced that it had so happened, although he was urged, against his will, by Joshua the son of Nun, to intervene in this matter, and for that reason he was not to be moved. Furthermore, in the book of Judges, and likewise in the books of Kingdoms, we observe that the Spirit of the Lord was upon very many, or leaped into them—as upon Othniel, Gideon, Jephthah, Samson, Saul, David, and various others. Which is so much the case that the Lord has most manifestly taught us the freedom and power of the Holy Spirit to come of its own accord upon them, saying:
'The Spirit breathes where it wills, and you hear its voice, but you know not whence it comes or whither it goes.' So that this same Spirit is sometimes found to be even upon those unworthy of it—not indeed idly nor without reason, but for the sake of some necessary working:
As it was upon Saul, upon whom the Spirit of God came and he prophesied—although at a later time, after the Spirit of the Lord had departed from him and after an evil spirit from the Lord vexed him, since he had then come last of all, following the messengers whom he had continually sent ahead to kill David, who for that reason fell in among the band of prophets and prophesied, so that they could not, or would not, accomplish what they had been ordered to do; which by a wonderful reasoning, through the will of God, we believe the Spirit that was upon them all to have wrought. This Spirit also filled John the Baptist while still from his mother's womb, and rested upon those who were with Cornelius the centurion before they were baptized with water.
Thus, since the Spirit clings to the baptism of men, whether it precedes or follows, or, when the baptism of water is lacking, rests upon those who believe, it gives us the counsel that we ought either to preserve baptism duly performed in its entirety, or, in the case of a baptism perhaps given by anyone in the name of Jesus Christ, to supply what is wanting—the most holy invocation of the name of Jesus Christ being preserved, as we have most fully expounded, and preserved besides the venerable custom and authority of so long a time and of so many men.
But since the first part of this discussion seems to have been unfolded, we ought also, on account of the heretics, to take up what follows; because it is exceedingly necessary not to pass over that treatise which has once fallen into our hands, lest perchance some heretic, by his cunning, should dare to assail those of the brethren who are simpler. For because John said that we are to be baptized in the Holy Spirit and in fire—inasmuch as he added, saying, 'and in fire'—for that reason certain desperate men have dared to extend their depravity in every direction, and therefore men of the keenest scent seek how they may so corrupt and violate the baptism of holiness as even to make it void:
who derive their origin from thence, from Simon Magus, exercising it with manifold perversity through various errors. To this Simon, Peter said in the Acts of the Apostles: 'Your money be with you unto perdition, because you thought that the grace of God could be possessed for money. You have no part nor lot in this matter, for your heart is not right before God.' And these men do all these things while they desire to deceive those who are simpler or more curious, and some of them attempt to hand down a baptism whole and perfect—handled by themselves alone—not, like ours, mutilated and cut short; which they are said to administer in such a way that as soon as men have gone down into the water, at once fire appears above the water.
But if this can be brought about by some trick—as very many tricks of this kind are affirmed to be Anaxilaus'—or whether there be something natural whereby this can happen, or whether they think they perceive this, or whether it be the work of the malign one and a magical poison that can produce fire in water: they nevertheless proclaim such deceit and trickery to be a perfect baptism; and if faithful men have been compelled to receive it, assuredly it will not be doubted that they have lost what they had—just as if some soldier, having sworn the oath of allegiance, deserting his own camp, should wish to swear a wholly different oath in the utterly opposed camp of the enemy: by this reasoning it is established that he has been discharged from his former oath.
Likewise, if a man of this kind should return again to you, you will surely be in doubt whether he has baptism or not; and yet you ought, in whatever ways you can, to come to the aid of this man too when he does penance. Now there is, if any other, an author of this adulterous—nay rather, deadly—baptism, and also a certain book, forged for this very error by these same heretics, which is entitled 'The Preaching of Paul.'
In which book, contrary to all the Scriptures, you will find Christ confessing his own sin—Christ who alone committed no sin whatever—and being compelled, almost against his will, by his mother Mary to receive John's baptism; likewise that, when he was baptized, fire was seen above the water, which is written in no Gospel; and that, after such long times, Peter and Paul—after conferring about the Gospel in Jerusalem, and their mutual deliberation and disputation and arrangement of matters to be done—at last, in the city, as though then for the first time, came to know one another; and certain other things of this sort, absurdly and shamefully fabricated, all of which you will find heaped together in that book.
But those who are not ignorant of the nature of the Holy Spirit understand that what was said about fire was said concerning the Spirit itself. For in the Acts of the Apostles, according to this same promise of our Lord, on the very day of Pentecost, when the Holy Spirit had descended upon the disciples so that they might be baptized in it, there were seen resting upon each of them tongues as it were of fire, so that it was established that they were baptized in the Holy Spirit and in fire—that is, in that Spirit which was either fire or as it were fire, such fire as was that which burned in the bush and did not consume the bush, and such as is that fire which is the spirit of the angels, as the Scripture says: 'Who makes his angels spirits and his ministers a burning fire.'
To which fire, when you have become like or a fellow or a partaker, you will be able to fear no fire—not even that fire which, going before the Lord on the day of judgment, shall consume the whole globe of the earth, except for those who have been baptized in the Holy Spirit and in fire. And to men, indeed, the Spirit remains invisible today, as the Lord says: 'The Spirit breathes where it wills, and you know not whence it comes or whither it goes.' But at the beginning of the mystery of faith and of spiritual baptism, this same Spirit was manifestly seen both to have settled upon the disciples as it were fire, and likewise, when the heavens were opened, to have descended upon the Lord in the likeness of a dove—since very many things, indeed almost all things that were to be, were made manifest:
which things, though they be in their manner nonetheless invisible, are now also, either in part or at times or in a figure, shown to the eyes and to the unbelief of men, for the strengthening and confirming of our faith. But neither would I omit that which the Gospel rightly proclaims. For our Lord says to the paralytic: 'Be of good cheer, son, your sins are forgiven you'—that he might show that hearts are cleansed by faith unto the obtaining of the remission of sins. Which remission of sins that woman also obtained who was a sinner in the city, to whom the Lord said: 'Your sins are forgiven you.' And when those who were reclining together began to say among themselves: 'Who is this who forgives sins?'—
just as also concerning the paralytic the scribes and Pharisees had murmured more bitterly—the Lord said to the woman: 'Your faith has saved you; go in peace.' From all which it is shown that hearts are cleansed by faith, but souls are washed by the Spirit; furthermore, that bodies are washed by water, and that by blood too one arrives more speedily, by a shortcut, at the rewards of salvation. I think we have fully carried through the preaching of John the Baptist, from which we took the beginning of our discourse, who said to the Jews: 'I indeed baptize you with water unto repentance; but he who comes after me is mightier than I, the strap of whose sandal I am not worthy to loose. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and with fire.'